Summer just began for me this year. I started back to school full-time this summer, just finished my finals, and as I come up for air, I get to inhale the summer grass, summer shine, summer waves, with a slow summer sigh. And yet.....two of my children start school in seven days, SEVEN DAYS.......while one gets to wait until September 6th (only because they are putting in a new playground and have some building code thingys to fix.)
Now, when I was back at the good old Woodrow Wilson Elementary in Salt Lake City, Utah, we never went to school before Labor Day. Life was less rushed, and that's not nostalgia speaking. We really did get to just play for quieter periods, for longer periods, with free reign. Summer seemed a full quarter of the year instead of eight-ish weeks. We actually made our own paper dolls with cardboard furniture, cooked mud pies in the tree oven and tried to mount a full production of Wizard of Oz. (The perfectionist in me trashed that idea when I could not figure out how to get my hands on ruby slippers---Target was but a gleam in some bullseye. Plus there was the flying monkey problem.)
Lest I paint a picture of an idyllic childhood, there were days of "let's play witch," which would now probably involve pseudo J.K Rowling characters. But back then, it was simply tying each other to the stake (metal porch pole) and enduring the wrath of the townspeople (siblings.) Sadly, one day my brother decided not to untie me after my turn at witch. I think someone came and got me before dark.....
There was also the time we were visiting our great aunt's during our lazy summer days, and the neighbor, not knowing what upstanding kids we were, accused us of stealing his croquet balls. Good times, huddling under the covers waiting for the sirens, dreading the felon life of the wrongly accused. Ah....summer memories. At least we were outside where we could logically be accused, instead in front of a screen all summer.
My favorite activity this summer is watching Spencer (11) take rehabilitation equipment and turn it into sport. A month ago, he bought a wheelchair for $5.00 from a neighbor boy (who come to find out, was told to throw it away in the community dumpster, but who sees Spencer, and gets a better idea.) They connive to save the chair from scrap metal hell and within minutes, Spencer is sporting wheelies. This is on the heels of taking crutches from the deep recesses of the closet, turning them upside-down, and walking on them like stilts.
Yeah, creative summer minds at work. Somewhere in the mix are water balloons, for sure, but not Otter Pops, which are banned from our house because my children do not know that getting the long, skinny plastic tubes of empty Otter Pops into the trash can requires walking over to said can rather than tossing willy-nilly or letting lie wherever the last sip occurs. These are children over the age of ten. It's sad really, because they almost got the privilege back, until I came home and saw the tell-tale plastic on the floor, and fell speechless. When did an Otter Pop cross our threshold and who is to be yelled at? I see all three boys bursting with the unbearable, delicious secret that they can no longer hold: they bought a box and have been partaking for awhile now, knowing their top secret stash would be safe in the freezer as my summer was busy with homework. The game was, to prove to me that they were responsible to the point of my not knowing they had the contraband. And it almost worked. Too bad I am a Nazi-garbage mom when it comes to those Otter Pops. Well, that and Easter grass. But that's spring, not summer.
